The Measure(5)

Frustrated by the lack of conclusions, the labs called for volunteer subjects with strings of varying lengths to be brought in for comparative medical testing, and that was when the scientists began to worry. In some cases, they could find no discernible difference between the health of the “short-stringers” and the “long-stringers,” as they soon came to be called. But, in others, the tests on many of those with short strings revealed dire results: undiscovered tumors, unforeseen heart conditions, untreated illnesses. While similar medical issues also turned up in the subjects with long strings, the distinction was alarmingly clear: Those with long strings had curable ailments, while those with short strings did not.

One at a time, like dominoes, each lab in each country confirmed it.

The long-stringers would live longer, and the short-stringers would die soon.

While the politicians were urging constituents to remain calm and maintain normalcy, the international research community was the first to confront the new reality. And no matter how many NDAs were signed, something this monumental could not be contained. After a month, the truth began to leak through the cracks in the laboratory walls, creating small puddles of knowledge that eventually grew into pools.

After a month, people started to believe.





Ben




“So, you seriously believe that these strings are some sort of lifeline? That they tell us how long we’re going to live?” the woman asked, her eyebrows arched. “You don’t think that sounds certifiably insane?”

Ben was sitting in a corner of a coffee shop, studying the blueprints of his firm’s latest venture, a flashy new science center at a university upstate. Back in February, Ben couldn’t stop thinking about this project, imagining all the future students who would someday study and work in the classrooms and labs that he helped design. Perhaps they would even make some world-changing discovery in the very building that he had first sketched out on a page at the back of his Moleskine.

But then, in March, the world did change. And now it was hard for Ben to even keep his focus on the plans in front of him. When he overheard the woman’s questions at the next table over, he couldn’t help but listen.

The woman was clearly an adamant denier, as at first many were.

But their ranks were dwindling week after week.

“I don’t know,” her companion said, less sure of himself. “I mean, the fact that they could just appear, out of nowhere, all over the world, has gotta be some sort of . . . magic.” He shook his head, perhaps not quite believing that this conversation was even occurring.

“There just has to be another explanation. Something realistic,” the woman said.

“Well, I guess some people are still talking about groups of vigilante hackers who’ve pulled some pretty big stunts before,” the man offered weakly. “But I don’t see how a group of nerds could ever be large enough to pull this off.”

Indeed, one of the most popular of the early rumors posited that an international network of hell-raising geniuses had come together to execute a prank of mind-blowing proportions. Of course, Ben saw the appeal: If it were all just a hoax, no one would be forced to accept the existence of God, or ghosts, or wizardry, or any of the other, more challenging theories currently swirling about. And, most importantly, nobody would have to confront the fate supposedly dictated by a piece of string in a peculiar box.

But this was too far-reaching for a man-made prank, Ben thought. And there was no one who seemed to profit from the boxes’ arrival, no clear intention other than catapulting the world’s inhabitants into a state of fear and confusion.

“So you’re comfortable concluding that it’s magic?” the woman asked.

It was strange for Ben to hear the strings referred to as “magic.” To him, magic was the handful of card and coin tricks that his grandfather taught him during family vacations at the beach in Cape May. Magic was sleight of hand, it was, “Pick a card, any card.” It may have looked amazing, but there was always an explanation behind it.

These strings weren’t magic.

“Then maybe it’s God.” The man shrugged. “Or multiple gods. The ancient Greeks believed in the Fates, right?”

“They also executed nonbelievers,” the woman said.

“That doesn’t mean they were wrong! Weren’t they the ones who figured out algebra? And democracy?”

The woman rolled her eyes.

“Okay, well, then how else do you explain all those stories about the short-stringers who died?” the man asked. “That fire in Brooklyn? All three of those guys had short strings.”

“When your sample size is the entire world, you’re bound to find anecdotes that support any theory,” the woman said.

Ben wondered if this was a first date. If it was, it didn’t seem to be going very well.

Like a reflex, Ben recalled the last first date he had gone on—with Claire, nearly two years earlier, at a café not unlike this one. How nervous he had been. But those first-date jitters, in the time before, suddenly seemed so trivial, worrying that you might knock over a coffee cup, or get spinach stuck in your teeth. Now you wondered how quickly the subject of the strings would come up, if your theories would align, when you might broach the sensitive question you were all too curious not to ask.

“Did you look at yours?”